MASHPEE — In Lisa Holmes' Mashpee High School culinary classroom, it's clear that green is the way to be.

On Friday, students in her Culinary 1 class cut up pieces of clear plastic water bottles they've been collecting around the school since September.

At first glance, the project was one of simple recycling, but the tumble of plastic bottles on the classroom's prep tables eventually will be made into a greenhouse, Holmes said.

"Lots of kids don't even know what a tomato plant looks like," she said. "But when they grow it, they'll eat it."

Before becoming a teacher at Mashpee High, Holmes taught classes at Falmouth's Highfield Hall and Police Athletic League, which included gardening.

Children who'd once turned up their noses at their veggies began happily eating mustard greens, and going out to the garden to get their own after-school snacks, she said.

"Kids would just go pick a cucumber and bite into it," she said.

Holmes wanted her high school students to experience the same, "but here you can't really grow vegetables during the school year."

So when Holmes came across the bottle greenhouse concept on the Internet, she decided to implement it this year.

Her approximately 100 students collected nearly 3,000 plastic bottles, which they cleaned and placed on long bamboo poles.

Members of Kevin Blute's applied technology class are building the 6-by-8-foot greenhouse frame and will construct the structure in the spring.

All told, the project cost about $500, which has been paid for through a Cape Cod Five Cents Savings Bank mini-grant, Holmes said.

Students were getting frustrated with the project, Holmes said, because disagreement with school officials over the greenhouse's site delayed its construction.

So on Friday, they were enthusiastic their project finally come together.

"Now they can see it happening. They're taking ownership of it," she said.

As her classmates continued to cut bottles, junior ShyAnn Jackson quickly installed a few poles in the two walls already constructed. Then she headed to Blute's classroom to work on more of the structure.

The project — and the wait — "has been really stressful," Jackson said. But it's a good opportunity, she said, to hone both her applied technology and culinary skills. She's also looking forward to working with the vegetables in the kitchen.

"I bring her recipes home all the time," she said about Holmes. "But the vegetables will be new."

For Kendall Cloutier and Tim Maciel, both freshmen, the project is one of teamwork. While most of Holmes' assignments are done solo, students have to work together to really make the greenhouse great, they said.

"It's been working out pretty well," Maciel said.

The greenhouse first will be for herbs and, by the next school year, a variety of vegetables. It will also be part of a larger, schoolwide effort to introduce students to healthy lifestyles, Holmes said.

Starting Tuesday, when the next semester begins, Holmes and teacher Aphrodite Purdy will launch LiveWell Mashpee, which will allow students to take coordinated classes in health and wellness.

"They'll get to take a more complex cooking class or a specialized PE class, like nine weeks of volleyball," Holmes said. "It's to get them to become more aware of their total wellness."